Community tackles prescription drug abuse

HopeRx hosts conversation about Henderson County issue

Published: Friday, November 8, 2013 at 7:14 a.m.

Last Modified: Friday, November 8, 2013 at 7:14 a.m.

Our medicine cabinets have become a loaded guns, says Todd Singer, director of HopeRx, a community coalition formed to address the problem of prescription drug abuse in Henderson County.

“This epidemic does not discriminate by race, religion, age, income or gender,” Singer said Thursday at a community conversation hosted by HopeRx at Blue Ridge Community College. “Each day, 100 children and adults die from prescription drug overdose (nationwide); each day 85 million Americans are in some way affected by this — these statistics are just the tip of the iceberg.”

Prescription drug-related deaths made up nearly 80 percent of the 1,140 unintentional poisoning deaths in North Carolina for 2011, according to the North Carolina State Center for Health Statistics.

At Thursday’s event, 100 local government officials, health care providers, law enforcement officers and concerned citizens gathered to discuss the impact of prescription drug abuse.

Individuals shared ways in which the issue affects them in their work.

Daniel Benavides with El Centro of Hendersonville said prescription drug abuse is a problem some families cannot acknowledge, even after the death of a loved one.

“Every time I see an obit for a person who is between 15 and 30 years of age, I wonder what it is,” Benavides said. “Sometimes a family will let it be known, ‘We have a problem’; other times, it’s under the rug — we have a prob­lem and you’re not going to hear it from my family.”

A Hendersonville police officer, who is not being named because he works on the narcotics task force, said he has noticed that people don’t seem to be as afraid of prescription drugs as they are of street drugs.

“The same stigma that’s attached to drugs like meth and crack and coke just isn’t attached to this,” the officer said. “One lady in particular who had a perfectly clean criminal history, 57 years old, she was selling $6,500 in pills a week.”

He said that he has noticed a large number of older individuals who have never committed a crime selling their prescriptions because of how lucrative it is.

“And I honestly believe that this woman would have never sold meth or coke because she had it in her head that that was such a horrible thing, but she was selling something that doctors hand out and it can’t be that bad,” the officer said.

Prescription drug abuse can be particularly hard to detect, participants said, because some people have legitimate prescriptions for documented medical conditions.

District Court Judge Emily Cowan said prescription abuse is difficult to detect through current drug screening of people already involved in the court system.

“Let’s say you have a prescription for one opiate, you can use any or as much as you want to and it’s still going to show that you just used an opiate, so you will have a clean drug screen,” Cowan said.

She said drugs such as methamphetamine or cocaine are much easier to detect because any amount in a person’s system is illegal.

To counteract the screening problem, Cowan said she has begun ordering pill counts in cases where abuse is suspected. That way a probation officer will be able to check to make sure that the person is not abusing a prescription or selling the drugs illegally.

Singer said HopeRx plans to facilitate more conversations so Henderson County residents can work together to find solutions to the problem of prescription drug abuse and overdose deaths.

<p>Our medicine cabinets have become a loaded guns, says Todd Singer, director of HopeRx, a community coalition formed to address the problem of prescription drug abuse in Henderson County.</p><p>“This epidemic does not discriminate by race, religion, age, income or gender,” Singer said Thursday at a community conversation hosted by HopeRx at Blue Ridge Community College. “Each day, 100 children and adults die from prescription drug overdose (nationwide); each day 85 million Americans are in some way affected by this — these statistics are just the tip of the iceberg.”</p><p>Prescription drug-related deaths made up nearly 80 percent of the 1,140 unintentional poisoning deaths in North Carolina for 2011, according to the North Carolina State Center for Health Statistics.</p><p>At Thursday's event, 100 local government officials, health care providers, law enforcement officers and concerned citizens gathered to discuss the impact of prescription drug abuse.</p><p>Individuals shared ways in which the issue affects them in their work.</p><p>Daniel Benavides with El Centro of Hendersonville said prescription drug abuse is a problem some families cannot acknowledge, even after the death of a loved one.</p><p>“Every time I see an obit for a person who is between 15 and 30 years of age, I wonder what it is,” Benavides said. “Sometimes a family will let it be known, 'We have a problem'; other times, it's under the rug — we have a prob­lem and you're not going to hear it from my family.”</p><p>A Hendersonville police officer, who is not being named because he works on the narcotics task force, said he has noticed that people don't seem to be as afraid of prescription drugs as they are of street drugs.</p><p>“The same stigma that's attached to drugs like meth and crack and coke just isn't attached to this,” the officer said. “One lady in particular who had a perfectly clean criminal history, 57 years old, she was selling $6,500 in pills a week.”</p><p>He said that he has noticed a large number of older individuals who have never committed a crime selling their prescriptions because of how lucrative it is.</p><p>“And I honestly believe that this woman would have never sold meth or coke because she had it in her head that that was such a horrible thing, but she was selling something that doctors hand out and it can't be that bad,” the officer said.</p><p>Prescription drug abuse can be particularly hard to detect, participants said, because some people have legitimate prescriptions for documented medical conditions.</p><p>District Court Judge Emily Cowan said prescription abuse is difficult to detect through current drug screening of people already involved in the court system.</p><p>“Let's say you have a prescription for one opiate, you can use any or as much as you want to and it's still going to show that you just used an opiate, so you will have a clean drug screen,” Cowan said.</p><p>She said drugs such as methamphetamine or cocaine are much easier to detect because any amount in a person's system is illegal.</p><p>To counteract the screening problem, Cowan said she has begun ordering pill counts in cases where abuse is suspected. That way a probation officer will be able to check to make sure that the person is not abusing a prescription or selling the drugs illegally.</p><p>Singer said HopeRx plans to facilitate more conversations so Henderson County residents can work together to find solutions to the problem of prescription drug abuse and overdose deaths.</p>